


Space Messaging

by zombiegardener



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Fluff, I should be working, M/M, Pre-Relationship, klance, mostly this is keith, pidge coran and allura are mentioned just barely
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-25
Updated: 2016-10-25
Packaged: 2018-08-24 16:31:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8379451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zombiegardener/pseuds/zombiegardener
Summary: Pidge figures out how to install a messaging system on Space Tablets (tm). Lance can't sleep and uses his to bug Keith. Keith doesn't hate it.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I'm trying to work and my phone keeps dinging. I needed someone else to suffer with me. I wrote this in 15 minutes and I'm posting it because if not it will keep distracting me and I need to be working. So there may be typos. If there are I'll probably fix them eventually because I'm a professional editor and they drive me crazy.

Keith had never really noticed that Lance had insomnia. Not every night, but enough of them.

The awareness didn't actually come until Pidge found a stock of tablets hidden in a storeroom/lab/all-purpose closet and realized that they could be set up to allow messaging. After converting them to translate the Altean alphabet into English through some sort of tech wizardry born in the middle of the night and explaining things like calendar reminders (not so necessary here, but whatever) and texting to Allura and Coran, they'd passed the tablets (or Space Tablet as Lance insisted on calling them) out to everyone.

It all started innocently enough. Coran seemed to enjoy sending random stories to anyone and everyone at random intervals, and Keith suspected Allura was sending random messages to Shiro after he caught his friend clutching his tablet and actually blushing.

He wasn't sure why Lance started to message him, but he thought maybe it was because it was late and Lance couldn't sleep and irritating Keith was one of his favorite activities when he was bored. He could always have messaged Pidge and talked to someone who had a fair chance of being awake, but that raised the risk of Pidge confiscating his tablet out of annoyance at the constant interruptions. Not even Lance was that desperate for entertainment. 

At first it was just random comments or questions.

"Was Shiro actually blushing at his Space Tablet earlier?"

"That dinner was awesome."

"How's your shoulder? That was a nasty hit you took today."

Sometimes he woke up when the tablet dinged, read the message, and went back to sleep. Other times he answered, though if pressed he wouldn't have been able to come up with a reason why. He even threatened to turn the sound off once or twice but somehow he always seemed to forget.

After a couple of weeks the messages got more serious and somehow turned into actual conversations about home, training, their teammates, their dreams. Things they never talked about during the day. They never acknowledged the messages out loud in any way, even when a conversation sometimes drifted over the course of more than one night. Some days Keith would find Lance watching him with a contemplative look on his face, although his eyes always darted away as soon as his gaze met Keith's. Other times someone would say something and he turned to Lance for a shared smile or on rare occasions even a laugh that neither of them even tried to explain.

Things might have continued that way forever if Lance hadn't hurt his hand in training. The injury wasn't severe, but it was sore and because it had come as a result of a stupid decision on both their parts it had been a tense afternoon. Keith was only half awake at best and was almost anxiously waiting for the ding from his tablet because he realized that he actually _wanted_ to talk to Lance when he heard the soft knock on his door.

Frowning, he climbed out of bed and hit unlock to be greeted with the sight of Lance standing in his doorway, hair mussed and wearing pajamas with a sheepish smile on his face.

"Hey, Lance." Keith's voice trailed off into a slight question and he kind of felt like an idiot, but this was new territory and he didn't really know what else to say.

"Hey." Lance shuffled his feet uncomfortably and a faint flush might have covered his cheeks, although it was difficult to tell in the dimness of the hallway. They looked at each other in silence for a few seconds before Lance shook himself and raised his bandaged hand. "So, it kind of hurts to type, but I wanted..." His uninjured hand came up and rubbed the back of his neck, which was practically his trademark signal of embarrassment.

Keith blinked at him. "Wanted to what?"

"Um, talk?" Lance turned and glanced back down the hallway like he wanted to bolt and Keith felt a slight moment of panic. 

"No, wait, come in." He might still be unsure what was going on, but he really didn't want Lance to go.

Lance turned back to him, his smile brightening slightly. "You sure?"

"Yeah," Keith answered too quickly. He felt an answering flush spread over his own face. "I mean, yeah, I want to talk to. To you." And now he was back to sounding like an idiot, though Lance didn't seem to notice or possibly care judging by the way he suddenly relaxed against the door frame. 

"Thank god, man, because I couldn't sleep and I felt like I was going to crawl out of my skin."

They crashed on Keith's bed in the dark, leaning against the back wall. Keith thought it would be awkward, but Lance just started asking him ridiculous questions like he did some nights and Keith went with it. It was nice to hear Lance's soft snort of laughter rather than having to imagine the sound in his head, and the darkness took away the weirdness they would have felt during the day as the conversation veered from light talk about nothing to more serious topics back to ridiculous. 

He woke up a couple of hours later without any memory of falling asleep. They were both still on top of the covers. Lance was curled up with his back against the wall and one hand around Keith's wrist. Keith was facing him and could just make out his profile in the faint glow of the Castle's nighttime lighting. To his surprise, waking up like this also wasn't as awkward as he would have expected if he'd ever really thought about it. He managed to grab the covers by nudging Lance out of the way and pulled them up over them both. He rolled over with his back to Lance and waited for the panic or sense of claustrophobia to swamp him with the knowledge that someone else was in his bed, but it never came. Instead, the sound of Lance's steady breathing was almost soothing in ways that he didn't think he was quite ready to deal with, and if in the morning he woke up with his back snuggled against Lance's chest and one of Lance's arms thrown loosely over his waist, that was also surprisingly fine.

All in all, it didn't change things that much. Some nights Keith went right to sleep, some nights they messaged each other for hours, and some nights when they didn't want to be alone they climbed into one of their beds together and talked until they finally fell asleep. They still argued, they still competed, they were still Keith and Lance. Now, though, he could see how they could be more- no, how they _would_ be more, he was pretty sure- when they eventually decided to clear that last hurdle and make the leap.

**Author's Note:**

> I wasn't supposed to post anything before I posted the next part of the other 3 fics I'm working on, but this doesn't count because it made me feel better about locking my phone in the kitchen cabinet two floors up from my basement office.


End file.
